I was surprised by the blatantly ideological nature of the Ann Arbor News article June 19 about a forum about the U.S. Patriot act. It seemed that the story had a clear message: the Ann Arbor city council should not pass the proposed Patriot Act resolution.

The fact that a representative of John Ashcroft’s Justice Department might not like the resolution is certainly newsworthy, but unsurprising. Also, I would have liked to hear what the president of the ACLU of Michigan, a well-respected attorney and author, had to say – but the article contained only one brief paraphrase of her comments.

The article doesn’t even approximate balance treatment of the event or a neutral pursuit of truth, instead pursuing an ideological agenda. I hope your newspaper’s coverage of this important resolution improves.